Hey Bill

I just remembered what the guy at Best Buy told me about my laptop. I misspoke. The jack does not actually come unsoldered from the motherboard. The little printed circuit solder "lands" that the jack connections solder to stay soldered to the jack leads. Instead, the physical force rips the "lands" loose from the printed circuit board. Eventually, the "lands" tear loose from the circuit foil and you lose the connection. When the bad jack is removed, those "lands" come with it, so there is nothing left to solder the new jack leads to. To the average repair person, this means a motherboard replacement. That's why the estimate was so high.

Ted